ITVBe was a British

free-to-air Free-to-air (FTA) services are television (TV) and radio services broadcast in unencrypted form, allowing any person with the appropriate receiving equipment to receive the signal and view or listen to the content without requiring a subscri ...

television Television (TV) is a telecommunication medium for transmitting moving images and sound. Additionally, the term can refer to a physical television set rather than the medium of transmission. Television is a mass medium for advertising, ...

channel owned by

ITV Digital Channels ITV Digital Channels Limited (formerly known as Granada Sky Broadcasting) is a subsidiary, wholly owned subsidiary of British broadcaster ITV plc. It was set up in 1996 and operated until 2004 as a joint venture between Granada plc and Sky U ...

, a division of

ITV plc ITV plc is a British media company that holds 13 of the 15 regional television licences that make up the ITV (TV network), ITV network (Channel 3), the oldest and largest commercial terrestrial television network in the United Kingdom. ITV plc ...

. Launched on 8 October 2014, the channel was positioned as a spin-off of

ITV2 ITV2 is a Television in the United Kingdom, British free-to-air television channel owned by ITV Digital Channels, a division of ITV plc. It was launched on 7 December 1998. For a number of years, it had the largest audience share after the fiv ...

targeting a female audience, focusing primarily upon

reality Reality is the sum or aggregate of everything in existence; everything that is not imagination, imaginary. Different Culture, cultures and Academic discipline, academic disciplines conceptualize it in various ways. Philosophical questions abo ...

and lifestyle programmes. In April 2025, ITV announced that ITVBe would close and be replaced by

ITV Quiz ITV Quiz is a British free-to-air television channel owned by ITV plc. The channel was first announced on 16 April 2025 and launched on 9 June 2025, replacing ITVBe. The channel primarily airs reruns of game shows produced for ITV. History ...

. ITVBe closed on 9 June 2025, and ITV Quiz launched the same day.

History

In February 2014, ITV announced that it would launch a new digital channel known as ITVBe by the end of the year. Positioned as a "companion" to

, ITVBe would be focused primarily on reality and lifestyle programmes targeting young adult women, such as '' The Only Way is Essex'' (whose first-run episodes moved from ITV2 to ITVBe at launch) and '' The Real Housewives'' franchise''.'' ITV director of television Peter Fincham explained that the new channel was "an opportunity to develop what is currently part of the ITV2 schedule—reality and non-scripted shows, which are very popular with young women and housewives with kids—into a distinct channel proposition, aimed more squarely at that audience." In July 2014, ITV announced that the channel would launch 8 October 2014. A high-definition simulcast, ITVBe HD, launched on Virgin Media on 19 November 2014, along with a one-hour timeshift feed, ITVBe +1. Both channels were exclusive to Virgin until the ITVBe +1 service was made available on Sky and Freesat on 15 December 2014, and the ITVBe HD service on 12 December 2023. As part of a number of changes to ITV's broadcasting, ITVBe +1 was removed from Sky and Freesat on 13 April 2021. ITVBe introduced a new children's block, LittleBe on 3 September 2018. It was dedicated to preschool programming and aired daily from 9:00a.m. to noon, with its slate including a reboot of long-time

CITV CITV is a British children's morning programming block on ITV2 and formerly a free-to-air channel owned by ITV plc. CITV, then Children's ITV, launched on 3 January 1983 as a late afternoon programming block on the ITV network for children aged ...

series '' Sooty''. The strand quietly ended on 31 May 2024, despite ITV reassuring that it would be retained following the closure of the CITV channel. On 3 September 2020, new episodes of ITVBe programmes began to premiere first on the ITV Hub streaming platform ahead of their linear television broadcast the same day, branded as "EarlyBe".

Closure

On 16 April 2025, ITV announced that ITVBe would close and be replaced by the new

game show A game show (or gameshow) is a genre of broadcast viewing entertainment where contestants compete in a game for rewards. The shows are typically directed by a game show host, host, who explains the rules of the program as well as commentating a ...

channel

. ITV Quiz launched on 9 June, and ITVBe's programming was moved to ITV2.

Most watched programmes

The following is a list of the ten most watched episodes of a series on ITVBe since the channel began broadcasting in October 2014. Figures are based on Live +7 data supplied by

BARB Barb or the BARBs or ''variation'' may refer to: People * Barb (name), a list of people and fictional characters with the given name or surname * Barb, a term used by fans of Nicki Minaj to refer to themselves * The Barbs, a band Places * Barb, ...

, vi

'' The Only Way Is Essex'' was consistently the highest rated series on ITVBe.

References

{{Freeview 2014 establishments in the United Kingdom ITV television channels Television channels and stations established in 2014 Television channels in the United Kingdom 2025 disestablishments in the United Kingdom Television channels and stations disestablished in 2025